This TQM article is a continuation of the article titled:TQM Implementation Project published on 13-May-2006. This issue is part 1a of the detail article on the subject. It will deal with the "How To" part of the DEFINE phase of the D.A.I.C. methodology described in the article. More detail sequential steps will be explained as well as the use of the appropriate tools in this DEFINE Phase

The DEFINE Phase

The objective of DEFINE Phase is to select a project for improvement. It is to be carried out systematically by using the appropriate tools listed. The tools are :-

Brain Storming | Multi Voting | Selection Grid | Problem Statement

Brainstorming
This is the simplest tools to use. Team members need to generate a list of projects they wish to undertake. In normal situation, it can be done easily by taking turn to give an idea, when ideas are exhausted, then it will open up to any member to give additional ideas without following any sequence. Once all members have exhausted their ideas, the brainstorming stops. The rule of this tool is several. One of them is not to stop member giving an idea.

Multi-Voting
The next step the team leader did was to group similar ideas into common name. This can be by going through the list one by one and identify their similarity. In most cases, the list would narrow down to about 5-10 ideas.

The next tool that team leader use is the Multi voting. The objective of this tool is to narrow done the list of ideas to 3-5 ideas. The method to do it is :-

a) Each member are given say 10 point
b) Member is required to allocate all the 10 points to ideas they choose.
c) Once each members has allocated all the points, team leader would tally and add all the vote
d) Team leader would rank the idea based on the total vote for each idea.
e) He would pick out 3-5 ideas from the ranking and write it into a new sheet of flip chart paper.

Selection Grid
Now the team leader can use the next tools i.e. Selection Grid to select a desired idea for their project. The object of this tool is to confirm one idea from the list of 3-5 ideas with some selection criteria agreed upfront. The additional rule for this tool is the selection criteria the team agreed to include. It is normally limit to 3-5 criteria for simplicity. Some of the common criteria chosen are:- management support, Funding, Impact to the company business, Knowledge of the member, Expected time taken for the project etc

Once the criteria are agreed, then team leader would write them on a flip chart paper on the Horizontal header. Then he would write the 3-5 ideas on a left column. (Please move to the resource box of this article to view this tool in graphic) . Using the selection criteria as a guide, team member would score from 1 to 5 each of these criteria for one idea at a time. Upon completion, team leader would tally and sum the score by the side. The highest score would be the selected idea for the project. At this stage, steps involved for a Selection Grid are completed. Hence, an idea for a project is selected.

Problem Statement
The final step in the DEFINE Phase is formulating a Problem Statement which would consist of three information namely; Current State, Impact to organization, and Desire State.
• For Current State, team member has to provide a brief description of the current state of affair include performance level etc.
• For the Impact to Organization, members has to include financial impact due to the under performance.
• And lastly, for the Desire State, member needs to provide goal and target after the project is completed to an improved state. It normally also include financial benefit to counter the Impact to Organization statement.

In summary, at the end of the DEFINE Phase of D.A.I.C. improvement methodology, team should have a clear understanding of the project they are going to work on, the expectation of the team in terms of making the improvement which should be aligned to the desired state of the project.

In my next article, I will write on a case study for this DEFINE Phase and How To Overcome some of the problem faced by member.

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Resource Box: About the Author, LM Foong

The author holds a MBA major in TQM. He is an expert in Malcolm Baldrige Business Framework and Baldrige Assessment and TQM Implementations in manufacturing and service sector. He facilitates workshops and Cost Reduction and Productivity Improvement projects. He publishes TQM articles, ebooks, case studies, trainer manual and presentation slides available at More TQM articles or Please Visit my Web Site.

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